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Neighbourhood plan to protect your community
BEARSTED Parish Council is preparing a neighbourhood plan. Donations
THE parish council has agreed to donate £100 towards the cost of the annual Christmas lunch for the vil- lage elderly. It also agreed, in line with last
year, to donate up to £500 towards the cost of hosting the Bearsted and Thurnham Fayre Presentation Evening, held as a thank you to the volunteers, participants and sup- porters of the fayre. Bearsted Parish Council is keen to recognise the huge amount of time which has been given to support this well-established event. The parish council will be review-
ing requests for donations in Febru- ary, so any requests should be made in writing to the clerk before then. The donation should benefit people of the parish.
Green events
THE council is to look at revising its policy for use of the Green. While the parish is fully in support
of charity events on the Green, it needs to ensure events are ade- quately insured and covered from a legal perspective. Individuals and organisations are
asked to give the parish council as much notice as possible should they wish to hold an event on the Green.
Newwebsite
A NEW parish council website should be ready within a fewweeks. The website will include agendas
and minutes of the council and its committee’s meetings, as well as an events calendar and, eventually, an online newsletter. Thewebsite will be more inclusive
and interactive, linking with social media such as Facebook andTwitter.
CCTV plan
A MOBILE CCTV camera could be brought in to monitor activity in the Church Landway car park. There have been further com-
plaints of anti-social activity, so the council has agreed to discuss what can be done with the PCSO.
Neighbourhood plans were in- troduced by the Localism Act 2012 and are away of helping local com- munities influence the planning of the area in which they live by de- veloping a shared vision for land development. The parish council plans to form
a working group, comprising members and residents, who would like an input into the plan. Aneighbourhood plan can cover
a range of planning issues that are locally important, for example the community facilities that are needed and the green spaces that
should be protected. As the first stage in the process Bearsted Parish Council has ap- plied to Maidstone Council to des- ignate a “neighbourhood area”. This is the area that the parish councilwants the plan to cover. The application which includes a
map of the proposed neighbour- hood area can be viewed at
www.maidstone.gov.uk/resi- dents/planning/local-plan/neigh- bourhood-plans2, on theparish council website,
www.bearsted-
parishcouncil.gov.uk, and on vil- lage notice boards.
The consultation began on Octo-
ber 16 and comments must be sub- mitted by 5pm on Friday November 17. There are no detailed plans at the moment since thesewill be the sub- ject of consultation and discussion with parishioners during the com- ing months. In the meantime, comments on
the application to prepare the plan should be sent to the Spatial Policy Team,Maidstone Borough Council, Maidstone House, King Street, Maidstone, ME15 6JQ - Neighbour-
hoodplanning@maidstone.gov.uk.
Councillors smarten up cottages
A GROUP of parish councillors rolled up their sleeves and got stuck in to cleaning up the rear of Smarts Cot- tages, on Bearsted Green. The working party (pictured) spent
a Sunday morning clearing the path ofweeds and removing an accumula- tion of leaves, leaving the path spick and span for residents and local peo- ple.
The parish council has also at-
tended to the parking bayat the front of Madginford shops, which was the subject of a complaint from resident Terence Turner. MrTurner complained to the parish
council last month about the dirty state of the pavement and parking bay and, although MaidstoneCouncil had said it would “try to keep it clean”, it claimed itwas difficult to sweep be- cause of the cars which are constantly parked there. The issue of the dilapidated fascias
at Madginford shops is now with Maidstone’s planning surveying de- partment. There is good news also for resi-
dents in Merton Road. The borough council has accepted responsibility for cutting the grass verge next to No 1 and it will now bemaintained by the council every twomonths.
Pollarded willows ‘may look a bit bald’
THE willow trees overhanging the pond on Bearsted Green are to be given a haircut. The parish council has already pruned some trees on the Ashford Road and the size of the willows, which drop leaves into the pond, has been a cause of concern. Consequently the trees are to be “pollarded” to control their size and extend their life. All required permissions have been obtained and qualified practitioners will carry out the work.
This page is sponsored and edited by:
Bearsted Parish Council
www.bearstedparishcouncil.gov.uk
24 Maidstone East November 2015 They may look a bit bald for a
few months but should be back to their former glory before too long. Pollarding is used to keep trees to
an aesthetically pleasing size. The height of both trees is becoming a concern and they are known to snap , especially in high winds. The spread of the larger one is causing the pond some degree of die-off. The leaves when shed are falling into the water and making the water acidic, the trees them- selves drink vast amounts of water
from the pond which is mains water-fed. The root system will be vast.
There are water, gas and electric services in the vicinity, not forget- ting the retainingwall between the road and the pond. The cost of re- pairing any of this through root damage would be immense and call for the trees to be removed. If they are pollarded and regu-
larly managed, the root spread is reduced and the life of the trees can be extended significantly.
Council Office: Madginford Hall, Bearsted Telephone: E-Mail:
01622 630165 Chairman:
clerk@bearstedparishcouncil.gov.uk Fiona Redman
MEETINGS HELD SECOND TUESDAYOFMONTH (7.30PM) AND THE PUBLIC IS VERY WELCOME
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